Friday, May 24, 2013

Pilot Attacks UFO

As mentioned in an
earlier post, there were pilots at the Citizen Hearing who told of intercepts
of UFOs in which the craft were fired on but the bullets and missiles had no
effect on the alien craft. I met the pilot of one of those missions just
outside the National Press Club right after our panel on Roswell had finished.
He was standing with Stan Friedman who called me over to look at a two page document
from the US Department of Defense with a stamped date of June 3, 1980.

I read it over and
noticed that it said, “The pilot, according to a third party, intercepted the
vehicle [UFO] and fired upon it at very close range without causing any
apparent damage.” I said to Stan, “We don’t know if he hit it.”

Stan said, “Why don’t
you ask him. He’s standing right here.”

The guy was standing next to Stan, so I asked
him. Comandante Oscar Santa Maria Huertas, a retired Peruvian Air Force pilot,
told me that he had, indeed, hit the UFO with his cannon fire as he tried to
intercept it.

Government documents, as well as the pilot, said
that on April 11, 1980 an object like a balloon was hanging suspended off the
end of the runaway about three miles away and about 2000 feet above the ground.
Huertas was ordered to take off and bring it down. The object, whatever it was,
was hovering in restricted airspace.

He took off in a Soviet
designed SU-22 fighter, reached an altitude of some 8,000 feet, and got into
position which would suggest he was above and behind the UFO. He fired a burst
of sixty-four 30 mm cannon shells. He said that some of the rounds “deviated”
from the target and fell away, but others hit it. He said that nothing happened
and it seemed as if the rounds had been absorbed by the “balloon” which then it
began to rise rapidly. It had now turned away from the base.

The “dogfight” didn’t
end there. According to the pilot, he gave chase but the UFO always stayed in
front of him. Huertas used the afterburners for additional speed but the UFO
seemed to maintain its distance from him. He continued to climb until he was at
36,000 feet and some fifty-two miles from the base.

He was in full
pursuit when the object stopped suddenly and he had to turn sharply to avoid a
collision. From that point on, he was unable to get another “shot” at the UFO.
Each time he was prepared to fire, the UFO would “escape by ascending
vertically” seconds before he would open fire.

He said that he
maneuvered into position twice more but before he could fire, the UFO again began
a rapid climb. He gave chase until they were at 46,000 feet. He decided to try
to get above it once again. By doing that, the UFO wouldn’t be able to suddenly
climb out of position. He bumped his speed to Mach 1.6, something around 1,150
miles an hour.

His plan failed. The
UFO suddenly climbed and fell into position near him, almost as if it was
flying formation with him until they were at 63,000 feet. That momentarily eliminated
his ability to attack it.

The UFO stopped again
and he adjusted his wings and slats so that he would be able to maneuver at
that altitude. He thought he might be able to get another shot at it now that
it was no longer moving but that turned out to be impossible.

At that time his fuel
warning light illuminated and he had just enough fuel to return to his base. He
had to break off the pursuit but before he left the area, he attempted one last
pass at the UFO. As he approached, to within 300 feet of the object, he saw
that it was about 35 feet in diameter with a shiny dome on top that was cream
colored. The bottom was silver that appeared to be metallic.

Although he never
talked to American officials, and he never reported the incident to any
American agency, as noted above, the Department of Defense received a report
about it. This apparently came from the US Embassy Defense Attaché in Peru.

The flight, according
to the pilot, lasted some twenty-two minutes. He had no conventional explanation
for what he had seen.

He claims he was climbing at Mach 1.6. That implies that he was using afterburner. I would guess that the service ceiling is computed based on the assumption of steady-state level flight using no thrust augmentation (straight turbojet, only). It’s quite possible, on jet fighters equipped with afterburners, to temporarily zoom to an altitude that can only be maintained by use of the afterburners. Of course, the fuel-burn rate in afterburner is hideous, so you can only do this for a few minutes before running out of fuel. Which is what he says happened. More or less as soon as he got wings level at 63,000 ft, he hit bingo fuel and had to return to base.

Part 1Tim wrote: “…even achieving Mach 1.6 (which is max on the Su-22) wouldn't he still eventually "flame out" and/or stall?”

Yes, and/or yes. But the two phenomena are not one and the same.

Basically, an aircraft in a given configuration weighs a certain amount at a particular point in time. In order to be in stable flight, the wings have to be able to generate an amount of lift that is equal to the aircraft weight. They do that by having a certain amount of air flow past them that is deflected downward by the angle of attack of the wing.

At low altitudes, where the air is thick it usually does not take much wing angle of attack to generate the necessary lift. As the aircraft goes higher and higher, the density of the air falls off exponentially, so the wing would have to operate at higher and higher angles of attack in order to generate the same lift. Every wing has a maximum limiting angle of attack (typically, somewhere around 12 to 15 degrees). Above that limiting angle of attack, the wing no longer generates lift, but it generates lots of drag. Once a wing transitions past its limiting angle of attack, it is said to be “stalled”. Because aerodynamic stall is primarily a function of the angle of attack, it can actually occur at any altitude. All that is required for aerodynamic stall to occur is for the pilot to pull back on the control stick too far, too fast and ask the wing to generate more lift than it is capable of at that airspeed. One of the most common situations in which aerodynamic stall occurs is just after takeoff when the aircraft is departing the runway (referred to as a “departure stall”). For a chilling video of what happens during departure stall, Google on that Boeing 747 freighter flight last month that crashed on takeoff from Afghanistan. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uIjO0sKBDDw

Flameout is a phenomenon that occurs in turbojet engines. A turbojet takes air in the front, compresses it, injects fuel into a portion of the air, combusts the fuel, allows the hot combustion gases to expand, which turn the power turbines, which turn the compressor, and so on. Again, because the atmosphere density decreases with altitude, as a jet engine goes higher and higher, the amount of oxygen in the airflow inside the engine that is available to burn the kerosene fuel also decreases. Therefore, the amount of fuel injected into the combustor also decreases with altitude, and the thrust also decreases. Eventually, there is not enough oxygen in the airflow to support combustion at all, and you get a “flameout”.

So, the overall pattern is that for a given aircraft to fly at a fixed speed at higher and higher altitudes, the wing angle of attack has to steadily increase, which maintains the required amount of lift, but at the cost of increasing drag. At the same time, the thrust available from the engine is steadily decreasing. So, at some altitude the increasing drag curve crosses the decreasing thrust curve, and that is (approximately) the service ceiling.

Usually, the service ceiling is nowhere near the flameout limit for the turbojet engine. For example, the twin-engine F-15 which has a service ceiling of around 60,000 ft was flown in a record-setting zoom-climb (“Streak Eagle”) to a peak altitude of around 103,000 ft. Flameout occurred around 98,000 ft, and it coasted the remaining 5,000 ft.

If you could suddenly add more thrust to the engine at the service ceiling, there is no aerodynamic reason the aircraft could not fly faster and higher. And that is where an afterburner comes in. An afterburner bypasses the airflow inside the turbojet and dumps fuel directly into the exhaust duct, where there is still enough oxygen available to support combustion. The sudden boost in thrust (sometimes as much as 2x) gives the airframe enough additional speed, that the wing can operate at a lower angle of attack with less drag and farther away from the point of aerodynamic stall.

Also: “…did he have wing tanks and had to jettison them to hit Mach 1.6?”

Wing tanks (used to extend range) would very likely have to be jettisoned in order to go supersonic. However, I think it is very unlikely that he was using wing tanks, if he took off from the airport that reported the object 3 miles off the end of the runway. In that case, range and endurance would not be an issue.

This event has been published in a number of books, along with the documents.

We have the first-hand account from the pilot, we have the first-hand observation of the event from Peruvian officers on the ground. We have a document prepared by the Defense Attache in Peru...

And yes, I know this doesn't take us to the extraterrestrial, but the event is real and documented, it is the interpretation that seems to be the argument here.

Oh, and Larry, the service ceiling is not the absolute ceiling of the aircraft. In the US Army, I know that the top line operation of the Hueys, for example, was underestimated by 10 to 20 percent. They could be safely operated above the red lines.

This is an interesting case. He discussion about the source of the documents above is a bit curious as the documentation is very clear in its provenience as Kevin has already stated. This is important as, whilst reporting information from a "source" in the Peruvian airforce this does establish that the incident was known of in the military at the time, and considered of interest by U.S. officials, which is understandable.We then have a credible witness providing evidence that is consistent with the documentary source and is quite evidential. The pattern of movements including the plane chasing the UFO without catching up for a period combined with it stopping and the plane getting above it etc rule out all the standard explanations as far as I can see, unless ( as no doubt will occurr) one assumes he simply made it up. That is we're the documentary source comes in as it shows the incident was being taken seriously at the time.Clearly not in the same league as some of the cases with multiple sensory channels but crosses the line in terms of evidence in my opinion. The apparent anticipation of events (as occurrs in some other high reliability cases such as Tehran) is very interesting and potentially takes us into some very complex and controversial areas, but perhaps that is one for another time.

Hi LancePossibly my bias ( we all have a few) but it may just be an example of the subtle differences between British and American English...the phrase 'line of attack' in this context might translate as something like 'line of argument'.

I'm with Lance on the "citation please," proviso -- on most blogs and websites, when one is explicating some info or story of an incident, I've personally always found it more appropriate and useful if the source or author provides links and/or citations within the article concerned to more fully background or source the documents or other data the blog post may reference for those who wish to look deeper into the subject being written about.

It's just simple, standard "netiquette" -- not required of course, but just helpful and provides the additional data needed for readers interested in reviewing the source documents concerned on their own more directly, rather than googling around for the docs referred to, which can be tedious, if not included in the blog post itself.

Unfortunately, the odd newish Google blogging option of linking to .jpgs of pictures or original documents noted within blog posts, for example, often does not blow the pix or docs up large enough to be readable, so links within the article usually work better, since then you not only can read/view the docs concerned better, but also see where they were sourced to.

That's why my personal habit is to provide links even within the comments I make when it seems appropriate, just like a print version of an article or book provides footnotes or similar related citation. This not only makes it easier on the curious reader, but better substantiates the presentation or arguments made within the article concerned. It really has nothing to do with assuming someone is "incapable of finding things" -- it's just good (or better) writing and substantiation, IMHO.

Although, in my case, I usually need to edit my comments content better, and be more succinct more often than I usually do; I've been accused at times of generating "word linen" or blocks of text or a series of comments whose breadth or length seems to upset some "tl;dr" folks, but that's just my written "stream of consciousness" style, OK? Ah'm tryin'(to edit better)... Mea culpa!

[So, whether my stuff is considered by some perrrsons as overly verbose, loquacious, or even bordering on logorrheic, i.e., overly wordy, at least it's pretty damn complete. But, I will admit I do need to focus on making more abbreviated commentary, since, hey, it's just yet another "loopy" blog comment, n'est-ce pas?]

"He fired a burst of sixty-four 30 mm cannon shells. He said that some of the rounds “deviated” from the target and fell away, but others hit it. He said that nothing happened and it seemed as if the rounds had been absorbed by the “balloon” which then it began to rise rapidly."

I don't how "verbatim" or accurate the paraphrase above of what the Peruvian SU-22 fighter pilot here may be, but it seems rather odd if "the rounds had been absorbed by the 'balloon'" on one hand, and yet on the other he allegedly said that some "deviated" away from the target, while others "hit it," don't you think? Seems a little bit of a discrepancy, of sorts.

Was this told to you directly by the pilot you apparently talked to briefly, KR, at the CHB event? Is it possible to clarify that difference in effect of his bullet rounds being either "deflected," hitting "it," or in turn being "absorbed"?

The differences in terms would possibly seem to suggest some differing forms of "defense" or "protective" mechanisms being involved if some of the rounds actually did hit or deflect, or become absorbed, would it not?

I just found those different effects being described with apparent variant results as pretty odd, personally. And, is there anywhere online that may contain the Peruvian pilot's actual, translated account in regard to this oddness? Pardon me if I seem overly curious, but as I've said before, such details do or may matter, at least IMHO.

@steve sawyerRegarding the deviation of some of the rounds etc. that is one of the more interesting features of the event....Hill (1995) may be relevant from a theoretical perspective if these things are using cyclic fields but that is speculative.